[aquamediale® 4]

Stadt.Land.Fluss

Since it was first held in 2004, the international culture festival aquamediale has established itself successfully in Lübben over the last 3 years. The focal point as always remains water as the elixir of life, as medium, and as world-wide cause for conflict, which is to be reacted at with cultural creations showing awareness of these problems.
Inspired by changing topics, so far more than 40 artists from eight countries have used the charming waters and meadows around Lübben to express their ideas about the vital element. In 2008 the organisers followed a well known pattern with „Stadt.Land.Fluss“, whereby knowledge, memory and speed are of the essence for the players, much the same as in the game with this title1 . In relation to the aquamediale this motto refers to the highly organised way of life in the metropolis Berlin compared to the rather contemplative existence in the county.
Ever since it was discovered to be a charming summer vacation some 180 years ago, big city dwellers are drawn to the Spreewald time and again. Therefore Lübben‘s waterways between the Schlossinsel and Liebesinsel are extremely appropriate scenes to culturally highlight any differences, contrasts, communalities and approaches around the topic „Stadt. Land. Fluss.“
Inspired by the contrast between metropolis and provincial regions, the participating artists have realised inventive water-themed ideas on the river Spree, on its river banks, under trees, and also on its streams, not omitting visual provocation. The objects and installations have been built along the waterways at 20 dedicated locations, and could not be more different: on the river bank, in trees, on bridges, as well as on, in, on top and beneath the water surface, works of art are taking shape, and, being delightful to the eye due to their unexpected and puzzled presence they stimulate reflective thinking through discernible social references.
Whether it is the vision of a holiday in the shape of an artificial tropical island floating in the grey concrete reality of the bridges, whether it is posting a dedicated piece of nature from Lübben to Berlin via photography, whether aquatic plants hiding behind red fence posts morph into a private piece of paradise or whether a log of oak has been adorned with a monstrous piece of jewellery at half height, it is always a result of critical debates, ultimately dealing with the topic in an entertaining and artistic way. Such as the Swede Jörgen Erkius, who enriched the almost completely organised cultural landscape with an artificially created natural phenomenon named „Strudel“ („whirlpool“). Adam Klimczak from Lodz expanded the interface between public and personal communication with an international dimension using mirror images of his family, hoping to thereby open new levels of communication. Differences between public and private affairs are also the topic of the French artist Nathalie Roussel in her Red Private Garden. In this case exotic aquatic plants grow behind the gates, signifying what one person can afford compared to another; Sonja Rosing from the Netherlands is following an old dream of heaven on earth without preconceived results with her floating mirror objects, only to question this dream with shattered mirrors. How far the topic reaches can be seen in the little mermaid Pago Pago by Klaus Killisch, which turns out to be a large digital photo from a 1940s Hollywood film and being a soldier‘s dream establishing a relationship to the Second World War in South East Asia.
The topic „Stadt.Land.Fluss“ provoked other participants to create objects which humorously and amicably taunt old and new customs of the people in the Spreewald. With a title full of associations called „Im Spreewald hängt der Himmel voller Gurken“ (literally:“ In the Spreewald Gherkins Fill the Sky“)2 the Berlin artist Irene Anton created a startling parable for tradition and modernity, whereby the gherkin as the regional hallmark is competing against the exchangeable offers in the spa tourism industry. Elsewhere and in a very unusual way Egidius Knops tries to answer the question of whether and how one can ship a tree, as a symbol of nature and longing, from the provincial region to the metropolis, and whether one can live without projections of being homesick. Nora Schöpfer from Innsbruck shows what happens when the urban world breaks into nature. Her filigree spatial objects remind us of anonymous metropolitan architecture as much as of virtual spaces. Inspired by light- and shadow impressions as well as shapes of branches of oaks and alders Mayumi Okabayashi from Japan created pyramids made from sheets of painted plastic, allowing the experience of the relation of inside to outside, of heaven to earth, as a „passage“.
Walter Gramming and ushi f, who like to consider scientific research on the state of society, named their transparent, neon coloured, storm defying, and wooden construction „Reason for Divorce“. The reasons, hooked on plates, are in part comments from boating tourists who commented on the topic of divorce reasons when riding by.
Near the water in the group of figures named „Copulating Gnats“ by the Sorbian participant Sofi Natuškec city and country find one another. The common Spreewald Gnat as the rather unpopular hallmark and the no less common Metropolitan Gnat merge into a graphical sculpture in this procreation.
At the end of the day it is of course the visitor‘s prerogative to choose which piece of art from the aquamediale he is happy with or annoyed by, whether he is smirking or contemplative. For us it is important to enable all those who board a boat in the ports of Lübben a casual encounter with modern art in a public space and therefore give a special touch to the tourism in Spreewald and widen the international flair of this region.
1 „Stadt.Land.Fluss“ is a game, often played by schoolchildren. Similar English speaking versions are sometimes called „categories“, „name-place-animal-thing“, „country-place-river“ or „Scattergories“.
2 The German proverb literally and in the original means „Heaven full of violins“, meaning someone is very happy (like „walking on air“ or „seeing everything through rose-tinted glasses“).